Republican Contenders Reach Out to Sheldon Adelson, Palms Up

LAS VEGAS — In a country wary of dynasties, former President George W. Bush said he could be a liability for his younger brother Jeb, a likely presidential candidate.

But he will never be a liability for the 700 Republican Jewish donors he spoke to in a ballroom here Saturday night. And especially not for Sheldon Adelson, the owner of the Venetian hotel and casino, where the Republican Jewish Coalition held its spring meeting, and the most sought-after donor in the contest for the Republican presidential nomination.

President Bush remains hugely popular with Mr. Adelson and other conservative members of the group, which has seen its numbers swell as tensions have increased between the Obama administration and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel.

Mr. Adelson became furious with Mr. Bush last month after the former Florida governor opted not to pressure James A. Baker III, one of the likely candidate’s foreign policy advisers and a secretary of state in his father’s administration, against speaking at a convention hosted by the liberal pro-Israel advocacy organization J Street.

Jeb Bush was not at the latest installment of the so-called Adelson primary — he appeared before the group last year. And while his brother explicitly avoided campaigning for him, his son, Jeb Bush Jr., pitched donors at a coffee shop in the casino.

Jeb Bush Jr. said that he shook hands with Mr. Adelson at an event the night before, and that he “admired him greatly in terms of what he does for this community and for the country.” He added that when it came to supporting Israel, his father’s “record speaks for itself,” but that the meeting was useful “in terms of outreach and engaging folks.”

Some of those folks definitely need reaching out to, starting with Mr. Adelson, who is worth an estimated $30 billion and can exercise enormous political influence in the “super PAC” era.

“He burned my ear up a little bit,” said Mel Sembler, a member of the Republican Jewish Coalition board and a longtime Bush family supporter who backs Jeb Bush. “He was upset, but I was upset myself, frankly. Jim Baker was out of line.”

Mr. Sembler said that the former Florida governor was just as upset over Mr. Baker’s remarks and that he doubted Mr. Adelson held them against Mr. Bush.

Mr. Bush has sought to convince coalition donors and Mr. Adelson that he has nothing to do with his father’s chief diplomat. On Thursday, CNN reported that Mr. Bush noted to members of the Manhattan Republican Party that Mr. Baker is in his 80s, and that he had younger foreign policy advisers.

Asked if he was talking to donors to convince them that Mr. Baker’s remarks were in no way a reflection on his father’s feelings about Israel, Jeb Bush Jr. said, “Absolutely,” arguing that people would see that his father was “his own man.”

“The Baker thing is a problem” for some donors, said Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, one of the would-be and already announced presidential candidates who were at the meeting. Mr. Graham added that he did not know if President Bush was here to help, but that “Jeb can overcome it.”

Mr. Graham got rare time to meet with Mr. Adelson, and the others did whatever they could to make their cases.

Senator Ted Cruz of Texas gave a speech that won plaudits from the assembled donors. (“Jews for Cruz,” some cheered.) Supporters of Mr. Rubio made the case for him on sidelines peppered with advisers to Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin.

Unwavering support for Israel’s government is the price of support from Mr. Adelson and the many other Republican donors here. But in an era when backing Israel has become Republican orthodoxy on par with reverence for tax cuts and Ronald Reagan, most candidates in the crowded field are already through the door. (“Our most cherished ally,” Gov. Mike Pence of Indiana said several times of Israel during his speech Saturday morning.)

Ari Fleischer, President George W. Bush’s press secretary and the Republican Jewish Coalition board member who interviewed him on stage Saturday night, said donors sought evidence of an “emotional commitment” on the issue.

But other donors said they sought something more, with most of the candidates saying the same things.

Kenneth J. Bialkin, another board member, said he was not swayed by “how much they can impress me on support of Israel. Support of Israel is the right thing, and every Republican candidate has a piece of that.”

And Mr. Adelson “wants to be able to field the strongest field,” Mr. Bialkin said.

In the last presidential election, many Republicans blamed Mr. Adelson for pumping $15 million into the primary campaign of Newt Gingrich, a long shot who used the money and time it afforded him to eviscerate Mitt Romney, the party’s eventual nominee, with political attack ads. This time, Mr. Adelson has expressed a desire to support a candidate who can win the general election.

And he finds himself on a political roll, at least in Israel, where his free and widely circulating newspaper, Israel Hayom, unabashedly backed Mr. Netanyahu.

When the prime minister made his controversial speech before Congress before the Israeli election, Mr. Adelson had a prominent seat in the House gallery. His wife accidentally dropped her purse on the head of a Democratic congressman, a mishap that many took as symbolic of what Mr. Adelson would like to do with his money.

This weekend, the candidates came to claim the purse.

Mr. Graham, who has joked that “I may have the first all-Jewish cabinet in America because of the pro-Israel funding,” met with a smaller group of donors on Saturday afternoon and said that if he did formally announce his candidacy, he would have a finance team “that you will be surprised by.”

“At the end of the day,” he said, “the Republican Jewish Coalition has become more powerful in Republican primaries than any time I can remember.”